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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25695580">Hands (S2 SPOILERS)</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zygomatique/pseuds/Zygomatique'>Zygomatique</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The Umbrella Academy (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst and Feels, Fix-It, Gen, Klaus Hargreeves Deserves Better, Klaus Hargreeves Needs A Hug, Season/Series 02 Spoilers, Spoilers</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-08-03</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-08-03</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 07:41:29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Major Character Death</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,200</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25695580</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zygomatique/pseuds/Zygomatique</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>A small, simple set of Klaus + Ben head-canons and "cut scenes" that should have been in there, dammit! Christ on a cracker, my heart hurts.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Ben Hargreeves &amp; Klaus Hargreeves, Dave/Klaus Hargreeves</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>140</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Hands (S2 SPOILERS)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>I don't usually write gen, but Season 2's last few eps left me d e v a s t a t e d as as Klaus fan, especially with such an incredible season building up to it. Klaus deserved more closure with Ben, he really did. And he also should've had a bamf moment in the finale, but that's another fix-it fic...stay tuned.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Hands.</p><p>It always came back to hands. Bony, rotting fingers, fish-cold and needle-nailed. Palms caked and streaked with death-black blood. Hands splayed wide like five-pointed stars, like the gold starfish hanging cold and heavy against his fluttering chest.</p><p>At least these hands were warm, Klaus reminded himself as they brushed past, angling towards his face, swiping at his sleeves, his shoulders, his hair. A hundred little mirrors, erected all around him like tiny gravestones. <em>Hello. Goodbye. Hello. Goodbye.</em></p><p>Warm hands beat cold hands every time. For years, Klaus had drowned himself in them. Warm hands in hot, dark rooms, squeezing his throat, tugging at his hair, snaking under his clothes and bruising bare skin. Hands burrowing into him, hot and butterslick and strong. But back then, he’d had the drugs, and no matter how deep the hands wormed their way into his body, they could never touch his insulated soul.</p><p>It was different now. Three years sober meant three years haunted, and he’d welcomed all the warm hands for blocking out the cold. But as his throngs of followers multiplied, Klaus found himself more and more often recoiling at their touch. Sure, he still relished a wanton romp in a sex swing with a believer or two, the guiltless hedonism of knowing Earth was doomed. But <em>so many</em> of them, swarming, as senseless as the dead. They smothered him. Like vultures. Like flies.</p><p>Klaus complained to Ben about it, knowing full well how much Ben craved the memory of skin. Klaus could be cruel like that. They both could.</p><p> </p><p>☂</p><p>
  <em>Don’t go chasing waterfalls.</em>
</p><p>What had kept Klaus sober three long years? There was the initial hope that he might find more of his siblings, wiped out in the blast or lost to time. There was his deepening power to corporealize Ben, which he’d relied on to earn his cred as a man of miracles. But mostly, as always, it was Dave. Dave was the <em>why</em>. Behind all the peace and love and lifted lyrics, the whole crazy notion that Klaus could get half a decade’s jump on the whole hippie thing, ignite the counterculture, and maybe maybe <em>maybe</em> even stop the war from even happening in the first place—was the foolish hope that he’d maybe have the chance to get through to Dave, keep him out of the army. Keep him safe.</p><p>As usual, the joke was on him. He’d suckered in all these sorry souls, who’d left behind grad school and grandkids to flock to him in droves, but Dave remained immune. All the adoration and attention Klaus had longed for his entire life was suddenly right there at his fingertips, and for what?</p><p>
  <em>One day he goes and takes a glimpse in the mirror, but he doesn’t recognize his own face. </em>
</p><p> </p><p>☂</p><p>“Fuck,” Klaus groaned, in full-blown hangover hell. Skull throbbing, stomach twisting, ears ringing, mouth dry, ass tender, hands shaking, legs a mile away. “I’ll tell you what, Ben. You can fucking keep it.”</p><p>“What are you talking about? Keep what?”</p><p>Klaus sighed, lay flat on his back, staring at the sloping ceiling. “My body.”</p><p>He didn’t have to turn his two-ton head; he could feel Ben’s frozen stare. “Klaus…”</p><p>Klaus would’ve liked to make a joke of it. <em>You know, seeing as you’re so jealous of all the hanky panky I’m getting from my minions.</em> But he didn’t have it in him just then. He had nothing. He was as empty as the fifth of Tanqueray still rolling impotent at his feet.</p><p>“Klaus, that’s not funny.”</p><p>“I’m serious, Ben. You deserve it so much more than me.”</p><p>“If you’re throwing another one of your pity parties, I’ll wait in the car.”</p><p>“Ben…listen. I am <em>giving</em> you the keys.” Now he did turn over, looking his brother in those judgy, judgy eyes of his, eyes that now looked surprisingly sad. “Look, you’re always saying I don’t take care of myself, and you’re right. You’re right! What good am I doing, bumbling about in this Grade-A meatsuit, like a baby chimp clomping around in Louboutins?“ In the back of his throat, something sour writhed. “I watched you, Ben…I could feel you inside me.”</p><p>“Yeah, you mentioned lesser Baldwins.”</p><p>Klaus almost laughed. He’d forgotten about that line, and fuck was he ever proud of it. Classic. But it was what he <em>hadn’t</em> said before that was strangling him now: that Ben’s sheer childlike wonder at feeling whole again had stirred something buried in his heart. Something warm. Something that hurt. “I could feel how it made you feel,” he tried again. “The sun. The dirt! With Jill…you were so <em>happy</em>.”</p><p>“It was pretty great,” Ben admitted.</p><p>“And you’ve earned it, Christ—all these years on a leash, acting out my parlor tricks? You deserve more. You deserve to live. To live – “ he gestured at himself, “in <em>this</em> limited edition luxury, no less.”</p><p>“Everything’s all or nothing with you,” said Ben. “Why does it have to be just <em>one</em> of us?”</p><p>“It’s true, there’s plenty of room in here for two. Hey, remember that time in Ibiza—”</p><p>“Rather not.”</p><p>“Just saying, you’re turning down a major upgrade, Benihana.” </p><p>"You’re just trying to get out of your hangover.”</p><p>“Can you check if I left a bottle—”</p><p>“No. I won’t.”</p><p>Klaus put a pillow over his face. “All these idiots think I’m some kind of savior. But I can’t save shit, Ben.”</p><p>“This is about Dave. All of this."</p><p>“Why can’t I help the one person who actually matters!”</p><p>“Everyone matters, Klaus. Including you.”</p><p> </p><p>☂</p><p> </p><p>“Come on, Klaus.” It was Ben, standing over him, now kneeling. “Get up. Get up, Klaus.”</p><p>“I can’t.” Vanya’s energy crashed over him like ocean waves, breaking against his nerves and bones, relentless. “I’m sorry. I can’t.”</p><p>Ben looked over towards the epicenter of the kaleidoscopic shockwave. “Maybe…” he said slowly, uncertain, “Maybe I can.”</p><p>Klaus looked at his brother, his dark eyes indigo in the barrage of blue. “The light…” he realized.</p><p>Ben nodded.</p><p>“But…you won’t come back,” Klaus rasped.</p><p>“If we don’t help Vanya, no one will. The thing is, Klaus… I’m already gone. I’ve been dead for 17 years. These years with you, they were just gravy.”</p><p>“Gravy’s...the..."</p><p>"-best part of turkey dinner?" Ben finished, almost smiling. "Yeah. I know. Now I gotta go.”</p><p>Klaus nodded, grief knotting up his throat. “Okay. Okay. You’re free. Ben.” Even as he said it, he refused to let go of Ben’s spectral hand. “I’m sorry.”</p><p>“Klaus,” Ben said softly, “…I’ve <em>been</em> free, all this time. To leave.”</p><p>You…you mean…” Klaus was fading, anchoring his consciousness to how solid Ben’s hand felt nestled in his own. He felt a deep tight warmth seep in between his lungs. “<em>I</em> wasn’t…?”</p><p>"I was scared to leave you. First for me. Then for you. But now...I'm not. Not anymore."</p><p>Klaus clasped Ben's hand for just a moment more, committing the weight and shape of it to memory. Then another tidal surge, and and Klaus’ palm was empty, reaching into blinding blue, waving one last time <em>Goodbye</em>. As his eyes fell closed, he watched his brother's silhouette grow smaller and smaller, walking towards their sister's light.</p>
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